Jenalyn: From the Inside (#3) [Complete]

Chapter 31: Hayden

Sunday, 11:45 A.M. EST

Ryan has made it a habit of taking his actual break whenever I'm able to squeeze in mine. I don't really mind it; I've actually started to look forward to the breaks because of him- even as just a time to vent to someone who isn't going to scribble down my every word in some notepad.

"Do you know who's coming for your visitation today?" He asks as he pulls a cigarette from the pocket on the inside of his dark blue scrubs.

I shake my head. "Nah, Evan doesn't come in until later... and even then, you know I'm not gonna ask Ren."

Ryan laughs and nods his head in agreement. "True," he murmurs under his breath, before exhaling his drag and turning to me. "Shit got pretty nasty between you two... how do you still even share a room? Shouldn't there have been a mandatory move after that shit? For safety purposes, at least?"

I let out a very sarcastic laugh. Nobody can seem to get over the way Ren lunged at me the other day when I lead her to believe that Dan and I had done the dirty.

It was done very subtlely... very indirectly! But Ren had been so insecure since the day I chose him as my peer counselor, so of course, she caught on.

I didn't react to her lunge, just stepped away and allowed her to stumble into a wall. 

At first, the staff just chalked it up to one of her 'meltdowns,' and gave her two days in confinement. But of course, Ren had to go and tell Evan about it and spin it into some story about how I'd been picking on her for a while.

And through all of that, she somehow has him convinced we still need to share a room.

"Apparently Evan assigns the rooms," I say after a few moments. "And you already know he's wrapped around her crazy little finger."

Ryan nods, but with a scoff. "That's bologna," He says, leaving a few moments of silence before he turns to me again. "Do you wanna switch rooms? I feel like if you put up a big enough stink about it, higher management would have to step in."

I've already given that question some thought. Would I switch rooms? This past week has been kind of crazy with Ren- if we're not pretending to be the best of friends, we're literally at war.

"Dr. Reyborn says I'm trying to fight a part of myself by fighting with her," I say as the thought creeps into my head. "She somehow analyzed this whole thing and came out with like- 4 more diagnoses' and treatment plans for me. Surprisingly, one of them was to continue to find discontent in Ren and her lack of will to heal. She thinks this is a good idea, I guess."

The words sounds surprising coming from my mouth when I pair it with the thoughts in my head.

Any other time, having four more diagnoses' piled onto my platter of mental health issues and being directly compared to a female that I've found I really can't fucking stand? I'd be losing my shit.

"So you're not even gonna try?" Ryan asks in disbelief after a second. "You must be crazier than I thought!"

I roll my eyes and playfully shove him. 

"Oh, the four more psychological disorders I got diagnosed with today weren't enough to prove that?" I ask, still unable to maintain my laughs. "Apparently, I'm just Ren with a couple of other personalities that don't share her horrible concoction of disorders!"

Ryan laughs too, only he falters off pretty quickly to turn to me once again. "Maybe I just haven't met the right one then," he says as he gently nudges me.

I flatten my eyebrows, turning to him as if to say he was crazy.

"Please," I say overdramatically, allowing my laughter to falter off before I go on. "This is the right one. As boring as I may seem... I could be Ren. And that should say a lot."

Ryan is silent for a few moments, staring at me as I pretend not to notice. The silence is interrupted by his over-exaggerated shoulder shrug, and him flicking his cigarette.

"I don't know," he says. "I wouldn't mind meeting her. And I'm sure Ren would have a harder time fighting Ren than Hayden, so this other you can't be all that bad to bring out sometimes."

My mind instantly grasps onto a select few of his words. 

Ren would have a hard time fighting Ren...

Maybe that's where I've been going wrong- we're both on different playing fields! 

Ren may be able to trump Hayden because she'll do a bunch of shit to gain a lead that Hayden just... can't do.

But could Ren trump Jena?

I guarantee Jena can do anything Ren can do better.

"That's not a horrible idea..." I say under my breath.